Hands Off the Brooms!

            You’d think religious people could do better. But the fact that we tend to train our guns on one another – sometimes scholarly, sometimes denominational, and sometimes literal – makes faith look foolish to whole hosts of people. “Why can’t those Christians all get along?” they ask in Rodney King fashion.

            It’s a perfectly legitimate question. While Jesus said his presence would have the effect of dividing family and friends, he expected those who chose to stand with him to stand with one another. Not to fight one another. But to be a family. A united community. A people who would be marked by a common loyalty.

            Jesus not only expected unity among his followers but prayed for it. “I ask not only on behalf of these [apostles], but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word,” he prayed, “that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (John 17:20-21). So why all the division? The church fights?

            For several years now, the world watches around the Christmas season for a possible brawl among the clergy-caretakers of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Folks certainly weren’t disappointed this time.

            Palestinean riot police had to come in to break up a fight between two groups of monks swinging at each other with brooms! Maybe you saw the video on TV. If you didn’t, millions of unbelievers did. They laughed. And they made both mental and public notes to the effect that this is why the whole “religion thing” is a farce.

            Three Christian traditions claim the traditional site of Jesus’ birth as their own. The Church of the Nativity – under their shared administration – is in such disrepair that the roof leaks and water runs through to damage the building. The three groups can’t agree who should pay for the repairs. Each of the three wants to pay in full; they just don’t want to join hands to share. So repairs aren’t made. And the damage continues – not just to a property but to a larger perception.

            This year a monk from one of the groups apparently was sweeping the floor in an area claimed by another group. Outrage! So a “holy man” from the group taking offense started the swinging. The melee began. The police had to be called. But the cameras had been rolling, and the event made headlines.

            An editorial by Giles Fraser in the (London) Guardian commented: “When that happens Christianity becomes petty and narrow, all about who cleans a few [square feet] of floor, rather than a means of imagining human life from the context of all eternity.” Indeed. But are most church fights less narrow and petty?

            Lord, heal your people! Friends, let’s keep hands off those broom handles!